Penn Hills musical 'The Addams Family' shows 'being normal' is not for everyone
How do you define “normal?”
For its spring musical, the cast at Penn Hills High School hopes to redefine the word through a show about America’s famously macabre household: The Addams Family.
The show will be performed at Penn Hills High School April 26 and 27 and May 3 and 4 at 7:30 p.m. and at 2 p.m. on May 5.
For Naomi Terrell, a senior who plays Morticia, “The Addams Family” shakes loose the bland “look” of normal while at the same time providing a model for love and acceptance.
“There is no normal — there’s just you. There’s a person. It doesn’t matter where you come from or who you grew up around. Love is love,” Terrell said.
Audiences can expect an ooky and kooky story about a grownup Wednesday Addams — double casted by Giavana Fiore, a senior, and Katherine Macioce, a junior — who falls in love with a young man from a respectable family whom her parents have never met.
Wednesday confides in her father and asks him not to tell her mother, putting Gomez Addams, played by Emmanuel Burkovich, 18, in a position in which he has never found himself — forced to keep a secret from his beloved Morticia.
Everything changes for the family when they host a dinner for Wednesday’s “normal” boyfriend and his parents.
The musical, rewritten by Marshall Brickman, Rick Elice and lyrics by Andrew Lippa, has been performed by high schools across the nation.
Kala Williams, the music director, said the show is fun and filled with energetic dancing that’s all wrapped up in a message that – click clicks – through the ages.
“It’s about not judging a book by its cover. Love can happen between anybody,” she said. “We love the fact that it’s about overcoming stereotypes and everybody can sort of just love unabashedly.”
Tickets for the musical will be available for purchase from 6 to 8 p.m. every Tuesday in April at the high school box office. Cost is $12, and they also are available at showclix.com or by calling 888-71-TICKETS.
Remove the ads from your TribLIVE reading experience but still support the journalists who create the content with TribLIVE Ad-Free.